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Since helping to create the Israeli hip-hop scene with his 2000 debut album, Jerusalem’s Sagol 59 has earned a considerable reputation as an honest, clever, articulate and highly original MC.

His pseudonym goes back to the days of his youth, spent on a Kibbutz. All the kids were assigned a color and number combination; his was purple (sagol) #59. It stuck. Considered an Israeli hip-hop pioneer, Sagol also hosts the monthly Corner Prophets/Old Jeruz Cipher Hip Hop events in Jerusalem, showcasing both established and up-and-coming artists.

Big Ben
Current Affairs
Shoah Business
Silver and Gold
Lech Kadima

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Yoni Ben-Yehuda, also known as Sneakas, was born in Tel-Aviv, Israel in 1981. After moving to Manhattan at age 11, Sneakas quickly became involved and fascinated by Hip-Hop culture. Using his extensive musical background, which includes classical training in both bass guitar and drums, Sneakas started writing rhymes and producing his own music. After years of honing his skills in the underground circuit of New York City, Sneakas was signed in 2001 to the production company, Nu Media whose credits include the Notorious B.I.G., LL Cool J, Brian McKnight, Babyface, TLC, The Fugees, Mary J. Blige and Prince. In the summer of 2003, Sneakas began a one-year tour in the Middle East performing in hundreds of clubs, festivals, fundraisers and venues. Since Sneakas return to New York in 2004 he continues to carve a niche for himself in the New York City Hip-Hop scene with performances at B.B Kings, Nuyorican Poets Café, Pussycat Lounge, Bowery Poetry Club, M1-5, The Groove, and The Bitter End.

Not My Single
Middle Eastern Jump-Off
Chain Reaction

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Coolooloosh is a leading musical force in the Israeli hip hop / funk scene. In 2003, five extremely talented musicians from Jerusalem, Israel, and around the world, found each other and came together to form one of the most unique and dynamic forces in the music world as we know it today.

Suitability named “Coolooloosh”, a Jerusalemite word for celebration and joy, this is precisely what the band exhumes with each and every exciting performance. Its like the experience of confetti being thrown.

Wooing fans around the world with their intelligent blend of genres, Coolooloosh. Combining Hip Hop, Rap, Jazz, Middle eastern and Funk, Coolooloosh, one of Israel’s most popular groups, is one of the very few well known emerging acts that can pull it off. Consistently, pushing the envelope, the band is destined to break internationally. A diverse group of individuals, from varied musical backgrounds the band consists of Yuval Gerstein (Guitar and Vocal), Rebel Sun (MC), Ori Winokur (Bass and vocal), Arik Levy (Saxophone), and Yogev Shitrit on Drums.

Combining both English and Hebrew text into their songs and unique blend of genres only further enhances their distinctive style. Following an extremely zealous show at the renown Sodra Theatre in Stockholm Sweden in May of this year, Coolooloosh forged on in August and September to continue an extremely successful and productive tour of Europe performing in the UK, Germany, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, France, and Hungary, including the well known festival “Spancirfest” in Croatia, gaining major attention and vast amounts of new fans at every show.

At the invitation of Grammy® nominated engineer/producer David Ivory (The Roots, Patti Labelle, Erykah Badu) the band will travel to the US in January of 2008 to begin pre-production and the tracking of their new full length album with Ivory at the helm. “These guys are really something special and unique. When my associate brought them to my attention, it was a no-brainer that I had to work with them” stated Ivory. In conjunction with recording the exciting new album, Coolooloosh will tour the US, including a show at the prestigious Kennedy Center in Washington DC. The band is in the process of setting up a May 2008 tour in the US for Israel’s 60th Independence Day celebrations.

Rapper/poet Rebel Sun was the subject of broad media attention for his fight to remain in Israel. He and his family recently were granted a permit to stay by the government, but during that struggle, the top artists of the Israeli hip hop world joined forces with the band to record a protest song entitled “Fight Rebel Sun” that detailed the story. The band’s music is a jazzier cousin to that of fellow Jerusalemites Hadag Nahash and in a style comparable to American counterparts Liquid Soul (Chicago) and Yo Flaco! (Denver).

Someplace
Conception
Coolooloosh
Just Wont Stop
Road Stone
Music Business
Until the Day

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Remedy Ross is an affiliate of the Wu-Tang Clan best known for his landmark Rap song “Never Again.” A Hip Hop artist, he leads an extraordinary program for Jewish youth that brings Remedy’s Jewish-themed lyrics, including his personal family account of loss in the Holocaust and his recent eye-opening experiences in Israel, to young people in search of a stronger Jewish identity. His song “Never Again”, written as a tribute to the Holocaust victims and survivors, appears on Wu-Tang’s “The Swarm” album in 1998 selling over one million copies world-wide and became a Jewish anthem.

Remedy’s program goes beyond a traditional performance. Between songs Remedy speaks about anti-Semitism, Jewish pride, Israel, and other topics relevant to today’s Jewish youth. Remedy also opens the floor to discussions, during which students are free to share their thoughts and questions on issues facing the Jewish people today.

Love My Land
Never Again
I like it (feat. SHI 360)

Ehad

“World Fusion Beat Scientists” Zohar are led by composer, producer and multi-instrumentalist Erran Baron Cohen, whose credits also  include of the popular Da Ali G and Borat movie sountracks.  ZOHAR weave together the beats and textures of modern club culture with hareem, hip-hop, electronica, dub and future grooves.  It is a deconstruction of past, present and future, spanning Jewish Cantors, Arab Muezzins, Byzantine chants, meets today’s modern jazz and experimental musicians. Their approach is resolutely experimental and uncompromising with an instinctive feel for lush cinematic arrangements and intelligent melodies.  Their acclaimed debut, One.Three.Seven.m was produced by Miles Copeland’s Ark 21 label.

The new album Do You Have any Faith? builds on ZOHAR’s previous reputation as underground pioneers of the oriental inspired jazzical influenced dance scene, that produced the legendry Buddha Bar compilations, Thievery Corporation, Dhizan and Kamien, Gotan Project and many others.   This new album features many exciting collaborations. Godfather of folk inspired jazz funk Terry Callier adds his spiritual presence to Roots in Jerusalem. The amazing voice of Tunisian Paris based singer Amina Annabi(who also starred in the epic”The Sheltering Sky”) sings beautifully on Une Ange en Paix, which also features the haunting oud playing of Nabil. Legendry Buddha Bar DJ Claude Challe features on Survival, and the powerful kawali voice of Riffat Sallamat make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up on the haunting Raga.

London-based ZOHAR have already picked up a dedicated body of fans through their performances both in the UK and internationally-USA, Bali, France, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Hungary, Latvia, and at UK festivals Glastonbury, Womad, The Essential Festival, Bracknell, and Homelands. Regular appearances at the trendy Momo’s Moroccan eaterie in Central London and other firing nightclubs like Cargo, Whirl-y-gig, China White and Heaven have added to their London presence.

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Bum Ching

Emunah are “the UK’s hot new Jewish hip-hop act”, say The Guardian. The band fuse the finest elements of world music with hip-hop, breaks and drum and bass, blending musical ingredients from Klezmer to Carlebach to Bhangra with kicking beats and driving, soulful basslines that never fail to get the crowd moving. Emunah’s members stem from a broad range of ethnicities including Russian, Jewish, Palestinian and Pakistani, and their songs fuse influences from Eastern Europe to the Middle East, from Jamaica to New York, and from Kashmir to London.

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My Garden

Y-Love (Yitz Jordan) is an MC unlike any other. He is a black convert into the Bostoner sect of chassidus (the mystical branch of Orthodox Judaism). He is among the most innovative freestylers on the scene, weaving seamless polyglot rhymes in English, Arabic, Yiddish, and Hebrew. Most unique is Y-Love’s revival of Aramaic, the language used to discuss Jewish Law and Kabbalah. With each word he spits in the tongue of ancient Babylon, Y-Love breathes new life into hip-hop, one beat at a time.

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Havana Nagila

Hip Hop Hoodios The band’s name is a play on hood and Judios, the Spanish word for Jew, and that is as good an explanation of where their backgrounds and of their Latin-Jewish sounds as there is. Drawing on their dual Latino-Jewish heritage, Hip Hop Hoodios combine the vitality of Latin alternative music with American-Jewish culture for fun-filled, trilingual mayhem. Led by Josue Noriega, the four band members have roots in Puerto Rico, Colombia, and Mexico as well as Jewish culture. Using a mix of live instrumentation and samples, they meld Hebrew with merengue and layer Jewish-themed rhymes atop salsa rhythms to create tracks like Havana Nagila off their CD’s, Raza Hoodia and Agua pa la Gente.

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Bim Bomb

This Bay area group performs hip-hop adaptations of traditional Jewish songs such as Bim Bam, Lecha Dodi, and Shalom Aleichem, infusing well known melodies with original raps that expand their themes and bring them up to date for the hip hop generation.

The Original Jewish Gangstas make beats, rhymes, and record new lyrics, using Pro-Tools, condensor mics, pre-amplifiers, and their own lyrical creativity to combine the wisdom of Judaism with the bump of hip-hop. If you are interested in making hip-hop history, then come flow with the OJG, as they reproduce traditional Jewish melodies live, either as part of an interactive service, concert performance or youth workshop.

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Promised Land

Born Rami Even-Esh to Israeli parents, Kosha Dillza grew up hearing hip hop pioneers, but it was a troubled adolescence of substance abuse, rehab and even incarceration. Determined to right his path, he vowed not to break the law and make teshuvah. He sought out spiritual and moral guidance and stumbled on the Jewish tradition of his birth. He put thoughts to paper as lyrical poetry, and found his own journey back to Judaism a powerful model and metaphor for his own personal struggle.

This combination of heritage and hip-hop found a life onstage, where Rami took on the name Kosha Dillz, dropping positive rhymes that represented his heritage in a unique and real way that quickly gained respect in the rap world.

Previously irreligious, Kosha belongs to a Maimonides study group and references his Jewish heritage throughout his music. Kosha Dillz came to explore his Judaism in the wake of a life of turmoil, and its come full circle back to hip hop. Now, he melds the two seemlessly as his craft and as his identity. Network charts.

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Yuri Lane is a one man sound machine technique who takes the audience on a hip hop journey using only his mouth and a microphone. He performs full length one-man shows, freestyle beatbox with Jewish and middle eastern influences and bibliodrama workshops for youth. He is best known for his shows Soundtrack City and From Tel Aviv to Ramallah. The latter is a hip hop journey about Amir, an Israeli dj and delivery boy from Tel Aviv, and Khalid, an internet café ower from Ramallah.

Their lives intertwine when they meet at a checkpoint in this modern retelling of Jacob and Esau. Set against the backdrop of ongoing violence in Israel, Lane’s piece asks for peace, understanding and coexistence in a unique beatbox style that has captivated thousands in New York, Detroit, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Chicago. Yuri also teaches biblio-drama, beatbox lessons and shows for young audiences on Jewish themes. An engaging entertainer for audiences of all ages and backgrounds.

Hear the music: Ladies and Gentlemen Booking and performance inquiries: info@j-arts.org